New Acquisition: Photographs of an early 20th-century production of Hamlet in Japan
Welcome to a new regular series here on The Collation! Curatorial staff will be writing short pieces focusing on new acquisitions, hopefully giving our readers a glimpse into how we’re building our collections. Today, I’m excited to share a small…
Fortune’s Fools: early tarot cards
As several of you guessed last week, this month’s crocodile mystery showed an early tarot card. When treating a copy of a 1673 edition of Vincent Reboul’s “Le Pelerinage de S. Maximin,” Folger conservators discovered two tarot cards used to…
Liverpool delft transfer-printed tiles; or, theatrical tiles explain’d
Thank you for all of your guesses on last week’s Crocodile Mystery! As several folks correctly surmised, this image is pigment on ceramic! Specifically, it is on a Liverpool delft transfer-printed tile, seen here in full: Jane Lessingham as Ophelia,…
Creating John Gregory’s Bas Reliefs at the Folger
Who carved the John Gregory’s bas reliefs on the facade of the Folger? Readers of last week’s Collation post will know that the apparently obvious answer—John Gregory—is incorrect. Sculptor John Gregory (1879–1958) definitely created the works of art, but professional…
An Unfinished Title Page Border?
Many thanks for your answers to last week’s post. They convey the puzzling nature of this title page border: Is it an unfinished work? Was it intended to be completed by readers of the book? Does it look different in…
Birdbrained
Thanks to everyone who took a guess on this month’s Crocodile Mystery! As several of you pointed out, the teaser image is of some breed of cockatoo or cockatiel. Although I usually know a hawk from a handsaw, I will…
The “Quartermaster’s Map” of England and Wales
Thanks for the excellent guesses on the identity of the August Crocodile Mystery! If you’ll permit me to indulge myself, I’ll prolong the suspense a little longer by showing some examples of what it might have been, but isn’t (and…
Words with pictures, or, What's in a name?
One of the points I like to make when I teach the History of Printed Book Illustration at Rare Book School is that images and words affect each other. The course deliberately focuses on illustrations—that is, on pictures and text…
Marks in Manuals
A guest post by Bénédicte Miyamoto Are these manuals I spy in the workshop? It is impossible to read the spines of the books in the illustration of an artist’s workshop in Salomon de Caus’s 1612 La perspectiue: auec la…
The Many Different Ways to Make a Lacemaking Pattern Book: The Case of Vinciolo's Book
Folger Shakespeare Library, NK9405.V5 1592 Cage. Photo by Caroline Duroselle-Melish Early modern lacemaking pattern books are ‘eye catching’ picture books with pages after pages of intricate designs. Unlike most modern pattern books, they generally include very little instructions on…
A late 15th-century tapestry fragment with visible restorations
Yes, indeed, the Folger collection item the March 2020 Crocodile Mystery is two-toned because of fading (and yes, indeed, it is a tapestry). Congratulations and thanks to Elisabeth, Ed, and Carolyn for their comments. The mystery wasn’t quite solved, though:…
Summer Retrospective: Woodcut, engraving, or what?
If you’ve ever been confused by the differences between woodcuts, engravings, and etchings, clearly you’re not alone! This post by Erin Blake, from 2012, is perennially one of our most popular. So in case you missed it the first time…